440hp Budget-Built Vortec Small-Block

1/1101. The foundation of our budget-built vortec small-block is a $1,150 short-block from Wheeler Motorsports.

Arguably the most critical engine components for unleashing big horsepower,free-flowing cylinder heads are usually what push the cost of a performance engine buildup far beyond "budget." And what good is having a 450hp mill if you can't afford to buy the gas to feed it? Fortunately, small-block Chevy guys have the production Vortec cylinder head available to them--a modern, high-performance cast-iron head that can be bought for little more cash outlay than a pocket port job on your obsolete castings. In stock form, their 0.450-inch lift limit is a downer for performance use, so we bought a pair of Scoggin-Dickey's specially modified Vortecs that can support over 0.550 inch of lift. It's hard to argue with the $635 price, either, and they're already assembled and ready to go.

2/1102. It's always a good idea to properly torque the oil-pump bolt on a small-block Chevy, especially when you're using a high-volume pump that exerts added stress on the fastener. Our affordable Melling pump produced a stout 25 psi of oil pressure at idle and climbed to 65 psi by 3,000 rpm. Before you tack-weld the pickup to the pump body, remove the bypass spring and ensure the pickup is oriented correctly to the pan.

But every good set of heads deserves a good short-block, and while we didn't require anything too exotic for our planned 400-plus horsepower level, we wanted a balanced rotating assembly with quality hardware, and flat-top pistons to yield near 10:1 compression. Too lazy to scour junkyards for a usable block, crank, and rods, we took the easy way out and ordered an assembled short-block from Wheeler Motorsports. One week later, the 0.060-over 350 arrived at our doorstep wearing a fresh coat of Chevy Orange. Easy.

3/1103. We used a trick Comp Cams three-piece billet-aluminum timing cover for our motor because we had frequent cam changes in mind for future dyno-testing. It's convenient for adjusting cam endplay on a roller setup or indexing the cam in conjunction with an adjustable sprocket (see "Cam Swaps Made Easy" in this issue). You can save a couple hundred bucks by using a stamped-steel cover.

Priced at $1,150, the Wheeler short-block is a pretty sweet deal. The four-bolt main blocks are line-bored, honed with torque plates, and zero-decked. The rotating assembly is fully reconditioned and balanced and rides on Clevite 77 bearings. The reconditioned stock rods are fitted with ARP bolts before they're fitted to Silvo-Lite Claimer hypereutectic flat-top pistons. So while none of the parts are ultra-trick Pro Stock equipment, they should hold together just fine through street abuse and the occasional dyno flogging. You'll have to piece together some of the random bolt-ons, such as an oil filter adapter, pump, pickup, and pan, as well as a timing cover. This may add up to considerable expense if you buy everything new, or it may be chump change if you reuse parts from another motor. Wheeler doesn't include a valvetrain set either, so we spec'd the totally streetable Comp 274 Xtreme Energy cam and matched it up a set of Coup lifters and pushrods.

Resisting the Popular Hot Rodding "trick parts allocation" temptation, we again called Scoggin-Dickey and ordered up as many stock GM components as we could to wrap up the engine build. Two sets of head bolts means ordering up two sets of PN 12495499, but you'll have to buy eight individual Vortec-style intake bolts (PN 12550027) as they're packaged individually. The special reusable Vortec intake gaskets are packaged in pairs, and the aforementioned intake bolts allow a specific amount of gasket compression before bottoming out on the deck--no more leaks. Scoggin-Dickey supplied a set of GM 1.5:1 stamped-steel self-aligning rockers, and we also ordered spendier LT4-style 1.6:1 full roller rockers to see if they'd free up a few more horsepower. Don't forget to pick up a harmonic balancer, too--we used GM PN 364709, a stock 8-inch unit. Although we started from scratch and purchased everything individually, you can save lots of cash by pirating some of this stuff from your old small-block.

7/1107. We've found the 750-cfm Edelbrock Performer to be an excellent fuel-metering system for high-performance street use. Although it's ultimately not as tunable as a modular-style carb, ours ran great right out of the box on this relatively mild motor. Should you need to tweak the mixture, the metering rods are readily accessible and available from Edelbrock. The carb's $219.95 price tag (Summit Racing) kept within our budget.

Although we'd already eclipsed the $2,000 mark, we still needed a carburetor and distributor. Edelbrock's 750-cfm square-bore Performer carb set us back a little over $200, and a stock HEI we had lying around filled the hole out back (new GM HEIs are about $200). Our dyno-test exhaust consisted of 13/4-inch long-tube headers with 31/2-inch collectors emptied into 3-inch pipes, terminated with three-chamber Flowmaster mufflers. It's probably overkill for this motor, but we used what we had.

Dyno-op Steve Brule strapped the Mouse onto Westech's Superflow dynamometer, hooked up the vitals, and fired it up. We were rewarded with good oil pressure, a lumpy, controlled 850-rpm idle, and snappy throttle response from the box-fresh Edelbrock carb. After a merciless afternoon of flogging, we'd richened up the metering rods, swapped to 1.6 rockers, and installed a 1-inch open spacer for a cumulative gain of 14 peak horsepower (442 hp at 5,900 rpm) and a couple lb-ft of peak torque (452 lb-ft at 4,400 rpm). Dollar for dollar, it's the bargain of the century that retains enough tire-shredding cojones to surely elevate your status at the cruise-in.

350 Chevy Parts and Prices

Unless otherwise noted, all prices are from {{{Summit}}} Racing as of May 23, 2002, and are subject to change. Taxes and shipping charges are not included.

Description

Mfr.

PN

Price

Xtreme Energy 274 cam

Comp Cams

CCA-12-246-3

$99.95

Hydraulic lifters

Comp Cams

CCA-812-16

66.95

Pushrods

Comp Cams

CCA-7812-16

29.95

750-cfm Performer carb

Edelbrock

EDL-1407

219.95

Performer RPM Vortec intake

Edelbrock

EDL-7116

173.95

1.5:1 stamped rocker arms

GM

12495490

49.95

1.6:1 roller rocker arms

GM

12370839

279.95

Harmonic balancer

GM

364709

125.00

Head bolts

GM

12495499

49.{{{90}}}

Intake bolts (2)

GM

SD12550027

14.95

Intake gaskets

GM

12529094

18.85

Oil filter adapter

GM

03952301

13.95

Oil filter adapter bolts (2)

GM

3951644

1.90

Rocker nuts (16)

GM

12557390

30.08

Spark plugs (8)

GM

R44LT5

9.04

Timing cover

GM

12513961

28.75

Timing set

GM

12341093

68.95

Valve covers

GM

12555269

58.00

Valve cover gaskets (2)

GM

10046089

9.85

High-volume oil pump

Melling

MEL-M55HV

19.95

Vortec high-lift heads

Scoggin-Dickey

SD8060A

635.50

Head gasket set

Victor Reinz

5746

44.98

350ci short-block assembly

Wheeler Motorsports

1,150.00

Total

$3,200.30

Dyno ResultsDon't be swayed by the stingy budget; this Vortec-headed Mouse cranks out enough power and torque to be right at home between the framerails of a stout street machine. We didn't want to dig into the engine too deeply, and concentrated on making cost-effective improvements to the combination. Although we witnessed a notable increase in power after swapping to 1.6 roller rockers and adding the Wilson Manifolds 1-inch open spacer, the mill is plenty capable (and several hundred dollars cheaper) in baseline tune.